Avoid The Sticky Mess Of Marshmallow Treats With A Genius Butter Hack

Marshmallow cereal treats have got to be one of the most beloved snacks ever. Staples of bake sales and classroom parties, even adults enjoy the sweet, buttery, crispy flavors of these timeless classics. And when you add some spice to Rice Krispies treats, they become even cozier. While eating them is an indulgent, joyful experience, making them can be equated with frustration because, let's face it, you're working with melted marshmallow, which becomes stickier than unfolding a crumpled ball of plastic wrap.

Once your marshmallows have been melted with butter and combined with rice cereal, the mixture is pressed into a baking dish to mold and cool. To further shape the treats into different shapes, some people coat their hands with butter or cooking spray during this step to prevent the mixture from sticking. But there's a better way — and it involves using a butter wrapper. 

Once you remove a wrapper from a stick of butter, the side touching the butter is extremely greasy and slick. Instead of using your hands to press the cereal mixture into a pan, just use the wrapper. You'll be able to push and form the sticky concoction into place with ease. It's a much tidier and less gross-feeling way to create these lunchbox darlings.

Using butter wrappers to form marshmallow cereal treats is just one handy way these slick papers are useful in the kitchen. In a way, butter wrappers are the new parmesan cheese rinds; whereas we once collectively threw them away once the cheese was gone, we've learned that they are useful for flavoring sauces, soups, and risottos. And just as vegetable scraps don't need to be thrown away or saved for compost — just freeze them until you're ready to make stock — the same goes for the wrappers. All you need to do is store your butter wrappers in the freezer until you're ready to use them in a variety of culinary ways.

Butter wrappers are perfect for a mess-free microwave experience, and are also ideal for greasing pans. Again, utilizing them in this way keeps you from having to use your hands to do the dirty, greasy job. You can also use the wrappers to rub over your knives and serving utensils before plunging them into food that would otherwise stick to them — lasagna, cake, brownies, and those pesky marshmallow cereal treats are common culprits.

If you've got any spare, you can also use butter wrappers to help with food storage. They're great for separating foods which can otherwise stick together in the freezer, such as burger patties or cookies — just slip a wrapper between each item.